@Hailinel said:

@Enigma777

@Hailinel said:

@Enigma777 said:

@DeF: If I wanted to go play Monster Hunter... I'll go play Monster Hunter. No thanks.

It's not Monster Hunter in the least. If you honestly think that Xenoblade plays like Monster Hunter, I suspect you have no idea how either game actually plays.

Great argument. Great.

How is Xenoblade basically Monster Hunter? You started it, you explain your argument first.

I've heard 4 different people compare it to MH in the last couple of days. And in the trailer I saw it looks MH-y but with some AI teammates thrown in the mix.

It's a shame the game is only available on pre-order and not in store. That and the fact that it's only available for the USA for now and nowhere else in north america. I don't understand why they don't do a normal release for all of north america on a tuesday like every other game. Other game risked much more and were not in the position nintendo is right now, it seems like poor marketing choice to me.

It's really a bummer because I was waiting to try it this month. Just a little rant I guess, the game may be really good but they are so slow to bring it to people for the company that has the most unit sold. Either way, hope people will enjoy the game.

@Darklight said:

It's a shame the game is only available on pre-order and not in store. That and the fact that it's only available for the USA for now and nowhere else in north america. I don't understand why they don't do a normal release for all of north america on a tuesday like every other game. Other game risked much more and were not in the position nintendo is right now, it seems like poor marketing choice to me.

It's really a bummer because I was waiting to try it this month. Just a little rant I guess, the game may be really good but they are so slow to bring it to people for the company that has the most unit sold. Either way, hope people will enjoy the game.

I'm in Canada and I picked it up about an hour ago.

@Darklight said:

It's a shame the game is only available on pre-order and not in store. That and the fact that it's only available for the USA for now and nowhere else in north america. I don't understand why they don't do a normal release for all of north america on a tuesday like every other game. Other game risked much more and were not in the position nintendo is right now, it seems like poor marketing choice to me.

It's really a bummer because I was waiting to try it this month. Just a little rant I guess, the game may be really good but they are so slow to bring it to people for the company that has the most unit sold. Either way, hope people will enjoy the game.

http://www.gonintendo.com/?mode=viewstory&id=174980 Canada - Xenoblade Chronicles preorders open at VideoGamesPlus

... the solution to your problem^^

@Enigma777 said:

@Hailinel said:

@Enigma777

@Hailinel said:

@Enigma777 said:

@DeF: If I wanted to go play Monster Hunter... I'll go play Monster Hunter. No thanks.

It's not Monster Hunter in the least. If you honestly think that Xenoblade plays like Monster Hunter, I suspect you have no idea how either game actually plays.

Great argument. Great.

How is Xenoblade basically Monster Hunter? You started it, you explain your argument first.

I've heard 4 different people compare it to MH in the last couple of days. And in the trailer I saw it looks MH-y but with some AI teammates thrown in the mix.

Monster Hunter's combat is slow, you have to be very precise and it's a lot about evading.

Xenoblade's combat is menu based but very active and fast paced, it relies heavily on chaining together specific skill attacks for certain effects while regular attacks are automated.

The way they are similar is that you sometimes fight a single big "monster" (enemy) and your characters all circle around it (positioning affects damage). That's where it starts and ends. It's basically nothing like MH.

@Ducksworth said:

@Darklight said:

It's a shame the game is only available on pre-order and not in store. That and the fact that it's only available for the USA for now and nowhere else in north america. I don't understand why they don't do a normal release for all of north america on a tuesday like every other game. Other game risked much more and were not in the position nintendo is right now, it seems like poor marketing choice to me.

It's really a bummer because I was waiting to try it this month. Just a little rant I guess, the game may be really good but they are so slow to bring it to people for the company that has the most unit sold. Either way, hope people will enjoy the game.

I'm in Canada and I picked it up about an hour ago.

:0!!!

You can buy it in store? I'll need to take a look tonight.Thanks for the info (and my sincere apologies to Nintendo if what I read about pre-order, not in store/outside USA was not true).

@Hailinel said:

every other gaming website under the sun that's put serious time into Xenoblade has found reason to praise the game.

They talked a lot about this game and jrpgs in general on the last episode of Weekend Confirmed, they had plenty of criticisms on the game and it's departure from the other games in the xeno series.

@Darklight said:

@Ducksworth said:

@Darklight said:

It's a shame the game is only available on pre-order and not in store. That and the fact that it's only available for the USA for now and nowhere else in north america. I don't understand why they don't do a normal release for all of north america on a tuesday like every other game. Other game risked much more and were not in the position nintendo is right now, it seems like poor marketing choice to me.

It's really a bummer because I was waiting to try it this month. Just a little rant I guess, the game may be really good but they are so slow to bring it to people for the company that has the most unit sold. Either way, hope people will enjoy the game.

I'm in Canada and I picked it up about an hour ago.

:0!!!

You can buy it in store? I'll need to take a look tonight.Thanks for the info (and my sincere apologies to Nintendo if what I read about pre-order, not in store/outside USA was not true).

Well, I'm not sure if you can get it in store. I had the game pre-ordered from Gamestop but I think you should be able to go up to a counter an purchase it because when they were putting the game up on display.

@Hailinel said:

every other gaming website under the sun that's put serious time into Xenoblade has found reason to praise the game.

They talked a lot about this game and jrpgs in general on the last episode of Weekend Confirmed, they had nothing good to say about this game and that it was a stain on a great franchise.

Already finished it. Searching for quest givers will drive you mad but otherwise this game is amazing.

The game plays and feels a lot like Rogue Galaxy ps2.

@Hailinel said:

@Kidavenger

@Hailinel said:

every other gaming website under the sun that's put serious time into Xenoblade has found reason to praise the game.

They talked a lot about this game and jrpgs in general on the last episode of Weekend Confirmed, they had nothing good to say about this game and that it was a stain on a great franchise.

It's evident that Weekend Confirmed didn't know what they were talking about if they thought Xenoblade had any connection to Xenogears or Xenosaga.

Nobody besides Ariel had played it yet and she went into the game thinking it was gonna be like the other Xeno-games which they already said years ago it wasn't gonna be. That was her main complaint, she didn't dig the story but liked the rest. "They had nothing good to say" is definitely not what happened. Garnett still is excited to play it and countered many of the complaints since he watched Ariel play in Japanese (he loved the music, loved the beautiful vistas).

Let's make clear the negative comments came from misinformed expectations but also let's not put words in their mouth.

You know what, I'm gonna play it. I've got this awesome widescreen Tube TV, with a component jack, Wii games look amazing on it, but it doesn't get used nearly enough. Now if only they still had those cool gold Classic controllers at Gamespot still...

@Def: You are right, I'm listening to it again right now, they liked the game, but had a lot of criticisms mainly based on expectations of the series, the story and the graphics. Anyway, it's worth listening to because they had a lengthy, intelligent conversation on this game and other upcoming jrpgs.

@alternate said:

Community knows this but demands a quick look of their favourite-de-jour, even though they have already made up their mind about the game.

Do people? If so they should stop that. I dunno, I know I am certainly not in the camp begging for them to do quick looks over any sort of rpgs, or games they have no interest in, in general. More than anything they just aren't even entertaining, which has always been my main reason for coming to the site back when it was still the weird blog thing. There is a world of difference in the quality of a quick look with a game they have no interest in to something that they think is just bad.

Personally I want them to do more of the latter.

@Zenaxzd: Some do. Witness all the "why on QL for Game X?" threads and "Why do GB hate Game X?".

That is why Binary Domain became such an in-joke, although it turned out the QL was worth doing in the end.

Completed it and put about 130 hours into it, I can confirm that this game is a JRPG.

@ArbitraryWater: I hope you are wrong, and yet my gut cannot deny my agreement.

Can't wait for Patrick's opinions on this great game.

The QL wasn't as long as I would have liked, but they gave the viewer a good taste of what to expect. Wish they had fought a unique monster so we could hear You Will Know Our Names, but what can you do. I don't recall that fight they kept dying on to be that tough either. Step up yo game, Patrick!

@ArbitraryWater said:

Who's ready for a combination of dismissiveness and ignorance from Patrick and whatever staff member he dragged along to do the quick look with? You know I am.

And it actually turned out to be well-reasoned and relatively informed.

I just watched the QL. It has compelled me to buy it. I haven't enjoyed a JRPG since Tales of Vesperia. But, this looks like it is up my alley.

@ninkendo said:

I don't recall that fight they kept dying on to be that tough either. Step up yo game, Patrick!

The kept dying part: It is because all he has done was the main story - just looking at his affinity board he had talked to only 3 people in the entire first city which means he missed loads of quests. Plus he said he was rushing to get to the open area segment thinking that area is much bigger than the first meaning he must not have explored how massive the actually starting area is (he wasn't even at the same level as the one of the unique-monster-missions - the big blue bird one). He was just severely under levelled for what he should be.

Anyway on to other things, It was a fantastic Quick Look though, props to Patrick for bringing up the big number of stuff in this game - he didn't explain everything (heck he hasn't even seen all of the tutorial stuff yet) but of what he did mention it was pretty well explained.

And some people are getting annoying about the talk of other JRPG's but I have to dissagree to those people - we can't condemn them for not knowing about/played every JRPG, especially since they weren't actually that negative on them anyway. Man some people are hard to please (almost makes me wonder why they watched it).

And some people are getting annoying about the talk of other JRPG's but I have to dissagree to those people - we can't condemn them for not knowing about/played every JRPG, especially since they weren't actually that negative on them anyway.

@Marokai said:

@Dixavd said:

And some people are getting annoying about the talk of other JRPG's but I have to dissagree to those people - we can't condemn them for not knowing about/played every JRPG, especially since they weren't actually that negative on them anyway.

You're right that we can't condemn them for just not playing many JRPGs or not knowing every little thing about every single one of them. People are perfectly justified, however, in condemning them for making broad qualitative statements about the entire genre based on years old stereotypes of what every other game in the genre is supposedly doing. That's all people get upset about. The genre is hardly perfect, but out of any current genre in video games, it is probably the most creative and varied, and overall is probably the genre that tries the hardest to do different things. I appreciate their more respectful tone in the Xenoblade QL, but it still frustrates me to no end that they still take a dismissive tone to the rest of a genre that they know almost nothing about, at this point. It may be difficult for them to recognize, given that they're getting older and set in their ways, but it's not excusable to continue basing their opinions on the genre from information gleaned from the late 90s. It's 2012, y'all.

I get why it annoys people and that speaking generally on any subject is going to annoy someone so it is probably bad form for the crew to talk about them generally at all. But my problem is that this is one of the times when they were the most held-back on it and the most real. They didn't use phrases that stated that all JRPG's are like X, they used instead phrases where all they had seen were where JRPG's were like X but they knew they didn't know the genre well enough to specify it was true.

I am totally on board with what you are saying, but just on the fact that they were drammatically better in this video on the subject than I have ever seen them in a QL means that I think fighting this battle as this point is sort of ridiculous as it won't make them do it less since the moment that they do try and do it less they are still hurt for it anyway. The arguements just seem out of place time-wise, they need to praise them when they do better (even if they add that they want them to continue to improve) rather than attacking them for it every time (whether they try to do it less or not).

Plus I want to argue that I don't like the sentiment that JRPG's have more innovation than other genres - while it is my favourite genre I do play almost all of them and I see innovation of different forms in every single one. I think the way we should go about this isn't about trying to push specifically the removal of JRPG stereotypes, and more asking them to stop stereotyping on any genre at all. (And to truly get that message across we need to not stereotype ourselves as well and refrain from insulting entire other genres when we feel like JRPG's are being insulted - it is a perfectly natural reaction but it is something that isn't good for either side).

TL:DR - I get why people are angry and the sentiment behind it, but we need to pick the right battles to bring this stuff up as if we bring it everytime no matter the extent of stereotyping people will no longer try to do less of it (instead just start ignoring us). And I personally don't think this is a great time to bring it up.

I am still waiting for the Hyperdimension Neptunia coverage I was promised a year ago.

I am still waiting for the Hyperdimension Neptunia coverage I was promised a year ago.